Essay
A* Twelfth Night Extract Exemplar Essay 6
Act 3, Scene 4; Malvolio professes his love for Olivia.
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Twelfth Night practice essay 62018 AS paper
This extract, taking place during the stage of peak disunity in Twelfth Night, encompasses
the execution of the gulling of Malvolio and Olivia’s confused reaction to his ‘strange manner’ after
which audiences may feel sympathy or continued antagonism towards Malvolio, depending on the
time period of the spectator. The extract is also notable for the establishment of Maria as the
instigator of Malvolio’s suffering and for Olivia’s obsession over the page ‘Cesario’, setting her up as
a victim of Viola’s disguise.
Immediately, the extract introduces the central misunderstanding of the play that is Olivia’s
infatuation for another woman, disguised as a man, yet played by a man in Elizabethan theatre.
While all characters are deceived by Viola’s disguise as the male Cesario, it could be argued that
Olivia is its greatest victim; the interrogatives contained in her first utterance ‘How shall I feast him?
What bestow of him?’ clearly demonstrate that she has become enchanted by Cesario and that she
is determined to secure his favour. The use of the masculine pronouns ‘him’ is an extremely
significant aspect of the comedy given that it indicates the exclusive bond created through dramatic
irony between the audience and Viola, whereby only we are aware that she is female and are thus
able to revel in the mistakes of all the characters in seeing her as a man. Revealing this as an ‘aside’
symbolises the illicit nature of Olivia’s love for Cesario which she must keep secret not only because
he is of the same gender, but also because he is a page and therefore a poor social match for the
Countess. She is therefore alone for a great deal of the play, surrounded by an aura of melancholy
akin to that of the Duke Orsino in chasing an unrequited love.
Further revealing is Olivia’s inability to ‘speak too loud’ in fear that Maria or someone else
will learn of her affections for Cesario, which could leave control of her destiny out of her own
hands. The fact that no other character learns that Olivia falls in love with Cesario – except,
ironically, the idiotic Sir Andrew – ensures that Twelfth Night does not see the traditional obstacles
to love of the comedic play, a role Sir Toby would have attempted (and did, but too late) to carry
out. As a result, Olivia is able to control her fate independently, which could be a consequence of the
inversions and misrule allowed for by the twelfth night season. Autonomy does not provide her with
happiness, however, as we see in her admission with regards to Malvolio ‘I am as mad as he if sad
and merry madness equal be’ that her love is self-destructive and causes her great suffering. Olivia is
perhaps the main conduit on which the theme of madness in the play is explored, as Shakespeare
implies a degree of absurdity about the Countess in her sudden and energetic chase of Cesario
almost straight after declaring herself in mourning in seven years for her dead brother. Clearly, Olivia
recognises her own folly, although it does not explain why she pursues the page so hastily. Later in
the play, her instruction to Sebastian ‘blame not this haste of mine’ acts as an unmistakeable
representation of her enigmatic character, since we never do learn what lies behind her veil and why
she acts with such ‘haste’.
The most significant element of this extract has to be the comedy behind the gulling of
Malvolio. It is important to note that the comic effect of the scene depends less on the speech as it is
written but rather on its visual performance; earlier in the play, on the advice of Olivia’s fake letter,
Malvolio had declared ‘I will be strange, stout, in yellow stockings and cross-gartered’. The written
extract does not therefore fully reveal the physical comedy that characterises the enduring image of
seeing Malvolio ridiculed on the stage dressed in such attire. When Malvolio draws attention to what
he is wearing in the utterance ‘this does make some obstruction in the blood, this cross-gartering’,
the humour of the scene is accentuated even further thanks to the use of dramatic irony, in the
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